Amateur Radio Stuff!

SOTA Wapley Hill (G/WB-016) 6th July 2013

Seeing how the day was nice and sunny, I decided to get out and do a SOTA activation. Looking at the summits page on sotawatch, I decided on Wapley Hill, in Herefordshire, which looked rather interesting, being the site of an iron Age Hill Fort.

Journey time from home was around an hour, even though I missed the turning off the B4362, and ended up having to turn back, courtesy of a roundabout on the outskirts of Presteigne! Being careful not to miss the turning again, I was soon in the car park, ready to go.

A fairly simple path using forest tracks soon had me close to the fort itself. A permissive path next to a rustic seat gave a nice short cut to the entrance.

Route up Wapley Hill

Rustic seat with permissive path to the right

End of the permissive path, the entrance

I stopped for a few moments to read the informative sign! (Click to read it!)

The informative board at the entrance

Looking around, once inside, I decided to set up on one of the mounds. In hindsight, which is a marvellous thing! this probably wasn’t a good move, as it appears that everyone (and his dog.. literally!) is intent on walking around on top of the mounds! Still, I hope I didn’t cause too much trouble

Operating position, possibly not a good one!

Centre of the hill fort, probably better for HF

I primarily worked on 2M FM, although dropped down to 40M to gain a S2S near the end of the activation.. Perhaps the operating position wasn’t ideal, but the middle of the hill fort would have shielded 2M signals a little, maybe next time I’ll use the middle of the fort which has room for quite large HF antennas!

The following were all logged in a fairly laid back hour and a half:

Time

Call

Band

Mode

Notes

12:59z

MW0IML/P

144MHz

FM

Barry on GW/NW-011 59+

13:00z

MW6GWR/P

144MHz

FM

Ricky on GW/NW-011 59

13:13z

G4ERP

144MHz

FM

Richard in Cheltenham

13:15z

2V0MDJ

144MHz

FM

Matt in Cheltenham

13:18z

G0LGS/P

144MHz

FM

Stewart in Birdlip

13:26z

2E0UPA

144MHz

FM

Jan on SULA lightship, Gloucester

13:31z

M0JLA

144MHz

FM

Rod in Hereford

13:36z

G8CMU

144MHz

FM

Mike in Ross on Wye

13:38z

G4WTF

144MHz

FM

Ian in Hereford

13:43z

2E0TLG

144MHz

FM

Duncan

14:15z

MM0YCJ/P

7MHz

SSB

Colwyn on GM/CS-088

14:25z

M0TYM/P

144MHz

FM

Alistair on G/WB-023

All in all a very pleasant afternoon in the sun, even if one walker did think I was calling in air strikes from nearby Shobdon Airfield!